As Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs offense finds their way in 2024, Kansas City continues to rack up wins, moving to 5-0 with Monday night's 26-13 victory over New Orleans.
K.C.'s ability to pummel opponents despite an offense that struggles to punch in touchdowns comes from a dominant defense.
"We've won different ways. At the end of the day, our defense is playing their tail off, and I think people are starting to come to realize that even more, even when we're getting these field goals (that) are keeping us in these games," Mahomes said Monday, via the team's official transcript. "Obviously, offensively we had a better day today – a lot of yards. Now, it's about finding ways to finish with touchdowns in the red zone so we can make these leaps bigger (and) faster and then we can really let (Defensive Coordinator Steve Spagnuolo) Spags be Spags. I think if we can do that then we'll continue to get better and better as the years go on."
Rolling to an undefeated start, Spagnuolo's defense is allowing 17.0 points per game and has given up 21-plus points once this season (Week 2 vs. Cincinnati). The Chiefs defense has carried the load dating back to last season. Kansas City has won 11 consecutive games (including playoffs) and has just a +74 point differential in that span, the narrowest margin of victory in an 11-game win streak all-time. They're the only team to win 11 consecutive games by a total point differential less than +85.
Monday night, the defense got off to a hot start with safety Bryan Cook intercepting Derek Carr on the opening possession.
"That was the important thing about it," Cook said, via the Kansas City Star. "We've been getting off to slow starts on defense. This time we made a play and cashed in."
Playing with the lead allows Spags to dictate gameplay to opposing offenses. Once again, K.C. squelched the opponent's ground game. The Chiefs held Alvin Kamara to 26 rush yards on 11 carries. The 2.4 yards per carry in Week 5 was the fifth-worst for the running back in 79 career games with 10-plus carries.
"Dominate the line of scrimmage," Chiefs linebacker Nick Bolton said. "We mixed up some different looks, some different fronts and confused their blocking a little bit. We won more one-on-one blocks than they did."
The Chiefs improved to 5-0 for the first time since 2018. It's the fifth time in franchise history they've started with a handful of victories without a defeat (made playoffs each of the previous four times). It marked the fourth time an Andy Reid-led Chiefs squad started 5-0, most of any team since his hiring in 2013.
